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An esoteric-historical interpretation of the life and teachings
of Krishnamurti is an important focus of this Web site.
The intent of this introduction is to provide some context
and indicate further areas of research.
First of all I like to thank Prof. James Santucci, editor
of Theosophical History Journal, for his permission to publish
on-line on Alpheus the paper Krishnamurti
and the World Teacher Project: Some Theosophical Perceptions.
This study presents a collection of the many very varied
Theosophical viewpoints of the metaphysical status of Krishnamurti
as a spiritual teacher. It focuses on two questions regarding
K: 1) was the project, initiated by Theosophists Annie Besant
and C.W. Leadbeater, to prepare the young Krishnamurti as
a vehicle for the World Teacher Lord Maitreya, a genuine
project or not?, and 2) was the project successful or not?
Prof. Santucci provided in his foreword
a necessary background and valuable additions to the main
text.
In the conclusion I made the suggestion to develop a comprehensive
theosophical hypothesis about Krishnamurti and in accordance
with this call I condensed my personal views in two pamphlets
titled: The
Masters and Their Emissaries: From H.P.B. to Guru Ma and
Beyond and Krishnamurti:
An Esoteric View of his Teachings. The first one is
what I think to be the correct chronological overview of
the Theosophical Adepts’ involvement with their embodied
representatives. The second is a metaphysical critique of
the teachings of Krishnamurti. Both pamphlets differ in
style from the paper in so far as the paper is academic,
non-theosophical and neutral, and the pamphlets are theological,
theosophical and unabashedly partisan.
Another reason why I wrote these pamphlets was that I thought
it was time to write something clear and straightforward
about the Masters and Krishnamurti. At the end of
the 1980s I became interested in the history of the theosophical
movement from an esoteric viewpoint. This was caused by
a simple question: What did the Masters think of the teachings
of Krishnamurti? Once posed, the question yielded, after
many years, an apparently complex and for me unexpected
and even startling answer. Now, many years later, I am able
to summarize it in a simple way. The pamphlets are a condensation
of my personal independent research into the lives and teachings
of the persons and views mentioned.
In my opinion the four most important Theosophical views
on Krishnamurti are provided by Cyril
Scott, David
Anrias , Geoffrey
Hodson and Elizabeth
Clare Prophet respectively. They all took the view that
the project was genuine, but that it did not come to fruition.
Many of the primary sources in which they expressed their
thoughts have been added to Alpheus. These include:
1) Scott's two chapters on Krishnamurti in his "The
Initiate in the Dark Cycle": a) Krishnamurti:
A Problem and b) The
Truth about Krishnamurti
2) Lord
Maitreya's message through David Anrias in his "Through
the Eyes of the Masters"
3) Geoffrey Hodson's booklet "Krishnamurti
and the Search for Light"
4) Kuthumi's
remarks on K through Elizabeth Prophet, and e) some
remarks by Prophet
herself on K.
Alpheus is now also linked to the important 1929 Truth
is a Pathless Land statement made by Krishnamurti when
he dissolved the Order of the Star. In it he outlined the
basics of his view on spiritual liberation and spiritual
organizations.
The texts of two serious and important theosophical studies
of K's early work have also been added. They are 1) J.J.
van der Leeuw's "Revelation
or Realization: The Conflict in Theosophy," which
sides more or less with K, and 2) Geoffrey Hodson's critique
of K, "Krishnamurti
and the Search for Light."
Recently Bill Keidan wrote an article for Alpheus titled
What really
happened to J. Krishnamurti?, which is primarily based
on Hodson's perception of K.
Aryel Sanat published on-line a comparative study of the
teachings of Krishnamurti and Blavatsky concerning the transformation
of consciousness, titled The
Secret Doctrine, Krishnamurti, and Transformation. Recently
Quest Books published Aryel Sanat's The Inner Life of
Krishnamurti: Private Passion and Perennial Wisdom,which
makes for now the strongest case for the position that the
World Teacher project with K was both genuine and successful.
Areas in which more research will yield interesting finds
might be the following:
- K's possible early exposure to Advaita Vedanta
through one of his teachers, the Theosophist Ernest
Wood, author of "The Pinnacle of Indian Thought,"
being a translation with commentaries of "The
Crest Jewel of Discrimination," written by
Advaita's founding father Shankaracharya.
- K's friendship with Vimala Thakar, the possibly
one and only person going through K's proposed radical
transformation of consciousness.
- A comparison of K's teachings with the philosophical
school of phenomenology, as started by M.M. Agrawal
in his "Consciousness and the Integrated Being:
Sartre and Krishnamurti" (Shimla, India: Indian
Institute of Advanced Studies, 1991) and V. Gunturu's
"Jiddu Krishnamurti's Gedanken auser der Phaenomenologischen
Perspective Edmund Husserl's" (Frankfurt: Peter
Lang, 1998. Ph.D. thesis).
- Sociological and comparative historical studies
of the Krishnamurti movement derived from the hypothesis
that it might be the beginning of a whole new global
civilization.
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